Escalation scenarios

In New England, the economics of wood gas are extremely attractive. Under the medium price scenario for 1985 and 1990, respectively, wood gas is projected to cost 3.11 and 3.25 per GJ. Wood gas is substantially cheaper than distillate oil and competitive with residual oil in both years under all scenarios. The same result holds in comparison to natural gas, with the exception of the high escalation scenario in 1990. Here the cost of gas exceeds that of natural gas by about. 20 per GJ. 

Escalation. One of the simplest of the systems archetypes, and one that we have all probably observed and identified, is the escalation scenario. A prominent example can be found in international terrorism. The obvious solution to terrorism is to punish it. Each terrorist act is met with stem punishment or reprisal. Each punishment is seen as unjust by the terrorists and is therefore met by increased terrorist activity. The terrorists believe they are right and that they must retaliate. The targets of terrorism also believe they are right and that they, too, must retaliate. Who is actually right does not have an impact on the outcome. The pattern continues. 

In business, price wars are an example of the escalation scenario. Again, each price reduction made by one competitor is met by a new round of price cuts by the others. 

The objective of emergency planning is to reduce die probability of serious loss due to a particular liazardous accident. The probability of an occurrence of a hazardous accident is first evaluated. It is tlien it is assumed tliat, if the accident occurs, tlie worst consequences will follow (tlie so-called worst-case scenario). Procedures for liandling a particular accident are tlien dex eloped and practiced, both to minimize tlie exposure of persoiuiel and to prevent escalation of the original incident. 

Osteoporosis is a world wide problem with consequences for both the individual affected and society as a whole. Osteoporosis affects an estimated 75 million people in Europe, USA and Japan. The estimated cost for the treatment of osteoporosis in the world is 18.3 billion dollars a year. Hip, vertebrae and wrist are the most frequent sites for osteoporotic fractures. Due to the increase in the population over 60 years of age this scenario is about to escalate and regarding one of the most serious fractures, the hip fracture, an increase with more than 200% is likely to occur. Today, approximately 1.6 million hip fractures happen yearly in the world and, in the nearest forty to fifty years, this number can increase to about 5 million. The risk of hip fractures is highest in Norway, Iceland, Sweden, Denmark and the United States (NIH 2000). 

These approaches essentially identify fire scenarios for all units and the consequences of those fires. If escalation is deemed possible, then additional damage is determined. Once the total damage is determined, a cost for replacement can be calculated. 

Smaller fire scenarios that can escalate and less severe but very likely scenarios should also be considered. 

The escalating use of networking services, such as the Internet, is continuously changing the scenario of CII. The utilization of information and communication technologies in central functions and procedures by all social and economic elements evolves with the development of technologies, and in different ways—and this is particularly true for the other critical infrastructures. The same policy and technical options for the protection of CII, and as a consequence CIP, are affected what can be today a sound protection option, might introduce vulnerabilities to be discovered much later. 

G. HL BEYER I believe you said that the first priority was to be accorded transportation, and I would like to have the panel s reaction to the scenario that if transportation is the most important priority, there is a good chance that fuel oil supplies for heating will dry up in the next ten or twelve years because that fuel oil will be made into gasoline and be outbid by the transportation aspect of the market and people who are now using fuel oil will experience a rather radical and rapidly escalating price. 

The cost of gas from the industrial boiler retrofit is compared to the delivered prices to the industrial sector of distillate and residual oil and natural gas. Comparisons are presented for the Midwest, New England and Northwest regions for 1985 and 1990 under three economic scenarios. The scenarios are based on assumptions regarding escalations in the price of oil and the resultant impacts on the prices of other conventional fuels. Scenarios are classified as low, medium, and high, corresponding to oil prices of 14.50, 15.15, and 19.72 per barrel, respectively, in 1990. The scenarios are part of DOE s current policy and evaluation program.(5)... 

Figure 4.1 illustrates the risk assessment process for qualitative and semi-quantitative techniques that can be apphed to transportation safety scenarios. Typically, these will be a scenario and issues developed and escalated for more detailed analysis during the identification and prioritization process described in Chapter 3. 

Efficient use of resources Ability to compare different transportation options Ability to easily make adjustments reflecting changing company priorities Ability to easily make adjustments to reflect changing transportation regulations Applicability to a wide range of transportation scenarios Ability to accoimt for many factors that influence risk Ability to address a range of consequences and likelihoods Ability to screen out and identify those issues that may need to be escalated for further analysis Ability to provide a preliminary relative risk estimate... 

Identification and Prioritization Consists of (1) cataloging the hazardous materials and modes of transportation, (2) identifying sensitive areas and potential points of failure along the transit route, and (3) understanding interactions with other stakeholders in the supply chain. This process enables the identification of shipments that may require special attention, including escalating issnes/scenarios for more detailed risk analysis. 

Occasionally one is faced with the scenario where the clinical risk associated with a hazard is unacceptable (i.e. where achievement of ALARP has failed). In this case it can be useful to promote the hazard to an issue. In this way the problem is ready to be picked up by the project team and be escalated accordingly. 

LOPA generally looks only at the risk associated with specific scenarios it does not consider cumulative risk in the manner shown for F-N curves in Chapter 1. Nor does a LOPA normally consider the escalation of events, i.e., the change in risk values as the event develops. 

Fatalities due to fires can happen either immediately after ignition of leaking hydrocarhon, or with a delay during escape of personnel, or as aresult of escalation. It is important in all these situations to predict the fire scenarios with adequate accuracy, in order to design hydrocarbon producing and processing installations such that the risk to safety of personnel is minimised. 

Determine the hazards and hazardous events of the EUC and the EUC control system under all reasonably foreseeable circumstances (including fault conditions and misuse). This shall include all relevant human factor issues, and shall give particular attention to abnormal or A hazard is an incipient condition and a hazardous situation occurs only when the condition is manifested AND the various layers of protection are breached. The accident itself (the hazardous situation) with a balance of probability of escalating to a major or catastrophic outcome. The storm scenario presented here is infrequent. 

As is seen from Fig. 11/4.3.1 -1, near the vicinity of the incident the severity will he more intense than further away. Also it gives an idea of the magnimde of the consequence of an event. To assure adequacy of the control measure it is necessary to realize the worst case scenario, which could be a cumulative or combination effect. Most likely the incident issue is important, hence the total range of hazards is important. Also the potential escalation zone at the interface area of the fatality zone and equipment zone is vital because severity in this zone may be wider. Qualitative estimation of consequences is done on the basis of previous experiences. In some cases, such as jet/flash fire gas dispersions, etc., detailed quantitative analysis based on computerized modeling may be called for. Various analysis types are discussed separately. 

For the worst-case foreseeable severe pool fire scenario severe pool fire or multiple tank / multiple bund fire (following an explosion or due to escalation) ... 

Establish immediate priorities and the potential for escalation. Local scenario-specific emergency response plans (ERPs) for the plant or area should at this time be made available to, and be used by, the ICT. 

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